The Eaton Democrat. (Eaton, Ohio) 1875-1903, 1887-01-20
THE NEW SOUTH.
Address Of H. w. Grady Before the
New England Society

Address Of n. w. Grady Before the
New England Society
At the Forefathers' Dinner in New York
Eloquent Tributes to Abraham Lin
coin, the Confederate Soldiers,
and the Restored Union.
Following are the salient passages in the
speech of Mr.. Henry W. Grady, of Atlanta,
Ga, delivered at the dinner of the New En-
gland Society, given on Forefather's Day at
Delmonico's, in New York City:
There was South OF secession and slavery
that South is dead. There is a South of union
and freedom-that South is living, breathing.
growing every hour" These words delivered
from the lips Of Benjamin b. Hill, in Tammany
Pardon me one word Mr.. President, spoken
for the purpose of getting into the volumes that
go out annually freighted with the rich eloQuence
of your speakers-the fact that the cavalier as
well as the Puritan was on this continent in its
early days, and he was ''up and able to be
find no mention of that fact, which seems to
me important for preserving sort of historical
equilibrium.
your charming little books, shall let him work
out his own salvation, Us he has always done
with engaging galiantry, and We win hold no
Neither Puritan nor cavalier long survived as
such. The virtues and traditions of both hap
SAVING Of od fashon Both and
cavalier were lost in the storm of their first rev.
olution and the American citizen, supplanting
of the Republic bought by their common blood
and fashioned in wisdom and charged himself
with teaching them free government and estab
God. Great types, like valuable plants, are
slow to flower and fruit. But from the union Of
these colonists, from the Strengthening Of their
o,,a fIo ,ccir yoff f,o;r
perfecting through century, came he who
stands as the first typical American, the first
who comprehended within himself all the
strength and gentleness, all the majesty and
grace of this Republic-Abraham Lincoln. He
was the sum of Puritan and cavalier, for in his
ardent nature were fused the virtues of both.
and in the depth of his great soul the faults Of
both were lost. He was greater than Puritan,
greater than cavalier in that he was American,
the vast and thrilling forces Of this ideal gov
ernment, charging 1t with such tremendous
meaning and SO elevating It above human suf-
fering that martyrdom, though UNANIMOUSLY
aimed, came as fitting crown to life conse-
cratee fr,iis -. -1ia.a.<~--Iet
us, each cherishing his traditions and honoring
his fathers, build with reverent hands to the
type of this simple but sublime life, in which all
types are honored, and in the common glory
plenty and to spare for your forefathers and for
mine.
In speaking to the toast which you have hon
ored me accept the term, 1.-THE New South" J" as
in no sense disparaging to the old. Dear to me,
sir, are the home of my childhood and the tradi-
tions of my people. There is a new South, not
through protest against the old, but because of
new conditions new adjustments, and, If you
please, new ideas and aspirations. 1t is to this
that address myself ask you, gentlemen, to
buttoning up in his faded gray jacket the parole
which was taken, testimony to his children of
his fidelity and faith, turned his face southward
from Appomattox in April, 1865. Think Of him
as ragged, half-starved, heavy-hearted, enfee-
bled BY want and wounds, having fought to ex-
bs he hs wTng h ns
graves that dot the old Virginia hills, pulls his
painful journey. What does he find-let me ask
you, who went to your homes eager to find all
the welcome you had justly earned, full pay
he find when he reaches the home he left four
years before! He finds his house in ruins, his
farm devastated, his slaves freed, his stock
killed, his barns empty, his trade destroyed, his
money worthless his social system, feudal in its
magnihcence, swept away, his people without
burdens Of others heavy on his shoulders
Crushed by defeat, his very traditions gone
without money, credit. employment, material
with the gravest problem that ever met human
intelligence-the establishment of status for
the vast body Of his liberated slaves.
What does he do-this hero in gray, with a
heart Of goid-does he sit down in suilenness
and despair? Not for a day. Surely God, who
has scourged him in his prosperity, inspired him
Overwhelming, never was restoration swifter
The soldier stepped from the trenches into the
furrow; horses that had charged Federal guns
marched before the plow, and fields that ran red
with human blood in April were green with the
harvest in June; women reared in luxury cut UT
their dresses and made breeches for their hus
bands, and with a patience and heroiSm that fits
woman always as garment gave their hands
to work. There was a little bitterness in al
'sBill Arp struck the keynote when he said
"Well killed as many of them as they did o
me, and now am going to works" or the sol
dier, returning home after defeat and roasting
some corn on the roadside, who made the re
mark to his comrades: "You may leave tht
South If you want to, but I am going to Sander
vile, kiss my wife and raise crop, and il tn,
Yankees fool with me any more will whip 'en
again" want to say to General Sherman, WHIT
Is considered an able man in our parts, thougl
some people think he is kind of careless mai
about fire-that from the ashes left in 1854 W,
have raised a brave and beautiful city; that
somehow or other, we have caught the SUNSHINE
in the bricks and mortar of our homes, and hav,
builded therein not one single ignoble prejudic'
or memory.
But what is the sum of our work. We hav,
found out that in the general summing up th'
| free negro counts more than he did as a slave
We have planted the schoolhouse on the hill
top, and made it free to white and black. W.
have sowed towns and cities in the place o
theories, and put business above politics. w,
have challenged your spinners in Massachusett
and your iron makers in in Pesnnsylvania; Pc W.
ceived from our cotton crop will make us rich
| when the supplies that make it are home
raised. We have reduced the commercial rat,
| are floating four per cent. bonds. We hav,
| learned that ore Northern immigrant is wort
] fifty foreigners, and have smoothed the path t
the southward, wiped out the place wher
Mason and DiXon's line used to be, and hun
| our latch-string out to you and yours. We hav
reached the point that marks perfect harmon
| in every household, when the husband confesse
| that the pies which his own wife cooks are q
good as those his mother used to bake; an
1rTatf hnf Hn fnnc hrtr or
| the moon as softly as 1t did "before tn
war" We have established thrift in city an
| country. We have fallen in love with work. w
| have restored comfort to homes from whic
| culture and elegance never departed. We hay
| let economy take root and spread among us a
| rank as the crab-grass which sprang from She,
| mans cavalry camps, until we are ready to Ia
| odds on the Georgia Yankee he squeeze
pure olive oil out of his cotton seed, against an
megs for flannel sausages in the valleys of Ve
| mont. Above all, we know that we have achieve
| in these piping times OF peace fuller ind,
pendence for the South than that which on
| fathers sought to win in the forum by their elt
| quence or compel on the fields by their sword:
1t is rare privilege sir, to have had par
| nobler duty confided to human hands than tn
up-building of the prostrate and bleeding Sout
misguided perhaps but beautiful in her suffe
| ing, and honest brave and generous always 1
the record of her social industrial and polite;
restoration we await with confidence the verde
| of the world.
|
problem he presents, or progressed in homo
and equity toward its solution: Let the recor
speak on this point. No section shows a mol
| prosperous population than the negroes of tn
South, none in fuller sympathy with the en-
ploying and land-ownng class He shares on
school fund, has the fullest protection Of ou
laws and the friendship of our people. Sci
interest as well as honor demand that he shoul
have this. Our future, our very existence d.
| pend upon our working out this problem in fu
| and exact justice. We understand that whe
| Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamatio
your victory assured, for he then con
mitted you to the cause of human ibert
| against which the arms of men can not preva
| while those of our statesmen who made SLAYER
| the cornerstone of the Confederacy doomed I
| to defeat, committing us to a cause that reaso
| could not defend or the sword maintain in tt
| light of advancing civilization. Had NJ
Toombs said, which he did not say, ths
| he would call the roll of his slaves at the fot
| of Bunker Hill he would have been FOOLS
| for he might have known that wheneve
| cIavary Iecare entnnUled in yyor II rn,,St peric